LuaLS / LuaLS/lua-language-server

Undefined global: vim, hs, mp, anything implicitly defined by a parent

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#3,099 1 comment 1 reaction 0 assignees View on GitHub

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Dominant language
Lua
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Description

How are you using the lua-language-server?

NeoVim

Which OS are you using?

MacOS

What is the issue affecting?

Diagnostics/Syntax Checking

Expected Behaviour

LuaLS should have an annotation to assume a global is already defined. I looked in the documentation and didn't see one, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Actual Behaviour

In Neovim, vim is defined as a global in the Lua init file, which LuaLS complains about. This is frequently worked around by adding it as a global setting to LuaLS, but imo this is a monkey patch because non-Neovim Lua code may benefit from a diagnostic for a missing vim global.

It also doesn't help for other programs that embed Lua and define their own globals. HammerSpoon defines hs and mpv defines mp. In these cases the diagnostic can be circumvented with a require but it's not idiomatic in these domains and doesn't work for Neovim.

Reproduction steps
  1. Edit NeoVim, HammerSpoon, or mpv script
  2. Add vim, hs, or mp to the respective script
  3. Run LuaLS on the script
Additional Notes

No response

Log File

No response

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

No source files or tests are named. Start by tracing LuaLS diagnostics and the existing global-setting configuration, then determine how parent-provided globals should be declared; done means Neovim, Hammerspoon, and mpv globals can be recognized without suppressing undefined-global diagnostics for unrelated names.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
lua
Domain
devtools
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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